"We are just so grateful for all the help we got to remove everything the night of the flooding," he said.

Kelly acted quickly when he walked down into the basement that night and saw water pouring in. He started removing records kept on shelves, with officers from the Sheriff's Department and personnel from the city Public Works Department assisting.

"That was the first thing that came to mind, that there were 60 years worth of records down there — everything, all the detailed records from death investigations over that period of time," Kelley said. "So yeah, there was lot of valuable information down there."

The Fond du Lac County Medical Examiner's Office serves 15 counties.

Kelley said some specimens kept in freezers in the basement, including materials to be sent out for toxicology results, were lost. That wasn't a huge issue, he said, since the specimens were "extras" and the originals were either in the first floor refrigerator or had been sent out for evaluation.

"After going through the cases where we lost specimens, luckily there is nothing that was an issue," he said.

Bodies kept in coolers on the first floor of the morgue and not affected by floodwater were removed on June 13 and taken to area funeral homes, where they were temporarily stored, O'Connor said. The bodies were removed from the premises due to fears about electricity at the morgue being shut off, O'Connor said.

In total, the Medical Examiner's Office incurred between $20,000 and $25,000 worth of damage, mainly due to an elevator that needs repair, said County Executive Allen Buechel.

The inoperable elevator has meant that bodies have to be hauled up to the first floor on carts the "old-fashioned way," meaning a little extra work for staff, Kelley said.

There has been talk of getting all of the morgue records into digital form, Kelley said. While that might be a ways off, there is one thing Kelley knows for sure.

"Nothing will be put in that basement as far as I'm concerned. Obviously, paper records will have to go in a different area — somewhere on the top two floors," he said. "We're done with the basement."